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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27672953">Smoke Gets in Your Eyes</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Metallic_Sweet/pseuds/Metallic_Sweet'>Metallic_Sweet</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>(when a lovely flame), Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Blue Lions Route, Gardens &amp; Gardening, Healing, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Moral Ambiguity, Post-War, Sharing a Bed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-09 01:27:33</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,712</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27672953</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Metallic_Sweet/pseuds/Metallic_Sweet</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>After the war, Lorenz brought Ferdinand home to Gloucester.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Ferdinand von Aegir/Lorenz Hellman Gloucester</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>48</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Smoke Gets in Your Eyes</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>After the war, Lorenz brought Ferdinand home to Gloucester. </p><p>It was unavoidable. At the start of the war, Ferdinand fled Aegir and the Empire along with supporters and went first north to the western territories of the Kingdom. After Fhirdiad fell and Dimitri thought lost, he and his supporters fled into the mountains. Lorenz has never been able to ascertain what exactly happened then, but Ferdinand and those remaining with him reappeared during the summer. They brought weapons and secrets and traded those at the Roundtable for safety within the Alliance. It was a desperate gamble that paid off, including for Lorenz, who gained Ferdinand’s support in the five and a half year long defense of the Bridge of Myrddin. </p><p>He did not have to bargain with Ferdinand to come home with him to Gloucester. Ferdinand came willingly because he understood that, at this time, he was at high risk for assassination until Fódlan stabilised. He let Lorenz sort his mail for him, and he allowed Lorenz to have a say in his schedule, which all meant he worked less than he had since the war began. Idleness had and would never suit Ferdinand. He let Lorenz brush and oil his hair and clip the dead and split ends, and he drank the herbals and potions Lorenz prepared him to help him eat when his stomach was rebellious and to feel less overwrought when his mind would not calm on its own. None of it made him well, but that was beside the point by then. </p><p>The war had ended as winter set in. Winters were, from Lorenz’s point of view, a bad time for Ferdinand. The lack of sunlight took his colour, and he always ate less because his wounds ached more. During the war, there were urgent things to focus on, and Lorenz had had to hold his tongue or at least acquiesce to necessity because Ferdinand was important to the war effort in a way that could not be duplicated. No one wanted to duplicate him either, so Lorenz had been as stuck as Ferdinand himself in their respective duties. </p><p>Without the war –</p><p>“What are you thinking about?” </p><p>Lorenz blinks. Looks up from his desk. Ferdinand is on the carpet by the hearth in his housecoat and nightclothes. The throw Lorenz keeps on his reading chair is laid over his legs and feet, and the large botanical text he’s been reading is open next to him a respectable distance from the fire. He watches Lorenz, the light at the back of his hair. </p><p>“The letter I am trying to write,” Lorenz says as Ferdinand rolls his hips over to sit straight and facing him fully. </p><p>“Making personal conversation with Byleth,” he says, and he smiles because, unlike Lorenz, he was Byleth’s student for a substantial period of time. “You do not need to overthink your words with them.” </p><p>Lorenz snorts. Byleth is Archbishop now, although he knows this has changed them little. He glances back at the several, empty opening lines, penciled onto the parchment. A greeting. A meaningless couple of opening senses. Half of a real sentence, denoting that something of a personal nature is troubling. </p><p>“It is late,” Ferdinand says.</p><p>Lorenz looks to him again. Ferdinand is still smiling, but it lacks the amusement from before. It is a private little upturn of the lips. It is a look that Lorenz has come to know well. </p><p>“Come to bed.” </p><p> </p><p>During the war, Lorenz learned to heal. </p><p>At first, it was simply logical. Lorenz has a gift in magic. As a boy, he enjoyed his Reason lessons greatly, and his aptitude was high enough he got into the Royal Academy of Sorcery on his own merit. Even though he had had to leave a full mage career behind, Lorenz always considered his abilities a great asset. It would help him stand out at the Officers Academy because most mages were physically weak, and Lorenz was adept at physical combat even if he did not personally prefer it. </p><p>When the war came, being able to heal was essential. Garreg Mach fell, and Lorenz healed wounds of his classmates in the rubble before he agreed to accompany Lysithea to Ordelia before returning to Gloucester. They spoke little on the ride through the mountains because Lysithea was afraid and unable to acknowledge it without losing her nerve. If Lorenz was a stronger person, he would have been able to comfort her. As it was, he was just as scared, and he would not be able to live with himself if his fear of the chaos of war and the road ahead of them was said aloud. </p><p>What little they did talk about was magic. They talked mostly about theory. Lysithea talked about Luna, which she had only just mastered, and Dark Spikes, which was the next spell she had begun studying. Lorenz found her to be a keen conversationalist, since he had only a modicum of talent in Dark Magic. He talked about the advanced Fire Reason theories he had recently been studying, and they bounced ideas off each other as they rode through the trees in the dim torchlight. </p><p>“I wish,” Lysithea said, so tired she could no longer be anything but honest, “we could have talked like this back at the academy.”</p><p>Lorenz swallowed. He kept his hands steady on his horse’s reins and blinked quickly to clear his eyes of sudden haze. It was the torch. It must have given off more smoke for a moment.</p><p>“Let’s talk like this more often,” Lysithea said into the armour covering Lorenz’s back, her fingers clenched alongside the ties on the sides. “I don’t want to wake up and find out this is just another bad dream.” </p><p>Lorenz nodded. Lysithea could not see it, but she could feel it. She did not call him out on how unsteady his breathing was. He did not mention that she was likely dripping tears and snot on his armour. </p><p>If it had been only a week before, Lorenz would have promised they would speak again. He would have promised other things, too, both possible and impossible. He had been overconfident, foolish, and so very innocent. </p><p>“Lysithea,” Lorenz said, and he did not care how his voice gave him away, just this once, “let us talk more now. What have you been studying of Faith magic?”</p><p>It was the right avenue to take. Lysithea sniffled and laughed, a fragile, sincere pairing of noises. She shifted, and Lorenz felt her feeling around at his sides for the pocket he kept his handkerchief. </p><p>“Not as much I should have,” she said once she found his handkerchief and began to wipe her face. “I only recently learned Nosferatu.”</p><p>“I am studying that,” Lorenz said, and he did not realise until the words left his mouth how needy they were; he excused himself once again to plow on with: “I have been struggling to understand the self-healing mechanism.”</p><p>“It is not as easy as it seems,” Lysithea says, and it is without any judgement and no little gratefulness. “Let me explain.”</p><p>They rode and spoke until sunlight filtered in through the trees. They stopped then and made camp, hiding themselves from view. They spoke no more until nightfall, sleeping only when the other was awake and dreading the sounds not of the forest. </p><p>This is how Lorenz began his war. </p><p> </p><p>The fact of the matter is:</p><p>Lorenz, like Ferdinand, was bred for war. </p><p>That is, in the end, the purpose of nobility. A noble has things to lose and things they dream of gaining. War is the theatre to squabble over what they do and do not have. All noble children, Crest-bearing or not, know that they will fight each other in some shape or form. They are themselves commodities for the fortune and folly of the world they are born in. </p><p>In the darkness of Lorenz’s bedroom, he traces the raised scars on Ferdinand’s torso. They are easy to find. Ferdinand is prone to healing messily, which is why his wounds tend to itch and ache even years after the injury has healed. Lorenz touches him specifically over these scars because Ferdinand has mentioned it was not unpleasant. The different feeling of Lorenz’s fingers, even without magic, offered some relief. </p><p>Underneath his slow tracing, Ferdinand’s breathing is even and deep. He is not asleep. The only times Ferdinand falls asleep before Lorenz is after battle and if he came first during sex. He lies still, relaxed under Lorenz’s hands but not pliant. </p><p>“You seem worried.” </p><p>Lorenz breathes in. Out. Not a sigh. Ferdinand lifts his left arm and touches his fingers to the crown of Lorenz’s head.</p><p>“Tell me.”</p><p>It is not an order. Ferdinand is the opposite of Lorenz in this. He doesn’t enjoy ordering people around off the battlefield and outside of necessity. Some people take this seeming mildness of his personality for softness, but it is not. Ferdinand is a fundamentally good person, but he is unkind and more than a little selfish. He dislikes ordering people because he would rather people feel they obey and agree with them on their own free will. It is a style that inspires a particular fervent brand of loyalty from troops and citizenry alike. </p><p>It makes Lorenz want to throw up. </p><p>“Don’t speak to me like that.” </p><p>Ferdinand’s fingers pull away from his head. Lorenz sits up. In the dim illumination from the night lamp, Ferdinand blinks up as Lorenz stares down. He isn’t surprised. His expression is somewhere between concerned and curious. It is not trusting insomuch as it is accommodating. From anyone else, it would feel like Lorenz is being humoured. From Ferdinand, it is simply what it is. </p><p>“I am sorry,” Ferdinand says, very quiet and so very sincere.</p><p>“I don’t want you to be sorry,” Lorenz says because that is not what he wants at all, but they are both useless here where there was never a battle to be fought. “I want you to be here when I wake up.” </p><p>Ferdinand smiles. Thin and very sad. Between them, there are no lies. He will not be here when Lorenz wakes up because Lorenz wakes after the sun, and Ferdinand’s body urges him into action before the roosters and songbirds. The war rewarded Ferdinand for his habits. It also, in its own way, rewarded Lorenz. If there was ever a time that could have changed this, it is gone. These are the bodies that bear their scars. </p><p>Lorenz breathes in. Out. He leans down and presses his lips to Ferdinand’s because he cannot bear the sadness reflected there. Ferdinand breathes in. Wraps his arms around Lorenz’s back, his hips shifting on the bed as his legs easily, eagerly spread. Lorenz lifts his knees and slots himself between them. Between the kiss, he reaches between Ferdinand’s thighs. He is warm and interested, and Lorenz wants him badly. </p><p>In Lorenz’s memory, the world burns.</p><p> </p><p>In the depths of the war, Gloucester burned. </p><p>It is House Gloucester’s duty to hold the Bridge of Myrddin. It is a responsibility that many acknowledge but few understand. Gloucester is rich, both in resources and in its place on major trade routes. Lorenz’s father and grandfather had been good businessmen and better politicians, even if their methods are not the sort Lorenz wishes to pursue himself. Merchants like to trade and operate in Gloucester because the taxes are lower, and there is a regular flow of travelers who are always in need of supplies. The town and surrounding villages are always busy, whether with raising the robust Gloucester cattle or milling the best quality grain in all of Fódlan. </p><p>In war, Gloucester is not only a strategic location but also a great resource for whomever controls it. Lorenz understood this better than any of his academy fellows and far better than Edelgard, Dimitri, and even Claude. House Gloucester, from Lorenz’s youth, had always had skirmishes and proddings from other Houses, and it paid a tithe each year to the Church for access to the protection of the Knights of Seiros. It was the only House in the Alliance to do so in addition to regular donations in the name of faith and virtue. </p><p>When Garreg Mach fell, it was just the forces of House Gloucester against the world. Lorenz watched his proud father beg for assistance from the Roundtable and receive only empty promises. He watched his mother reach out to relatives in the eastern Kingdom only to be informed of the fall of the House Blaiddyd. He watched as both of his parents sold personal jewelry to pay off secret messengers who brought information from the Empire. He curled his fingers around the handle of Thyrsus as his parents saw him off to the Bridge once, twice, infinite times and knew the field for what it was. </p><p>That was how Lorenz spent the war. From his vantage point on the Bridge, he watched red dawns cresting over the river and the hills. Some days, the sun was blotted out by heavy smoke that left behind bone ash on the bridge itself. The injured and the ill wandered onto the Bridge, begging for safety and food and medicine. Sometimes they wore Adrestian red or Leicester yellow, but more often than not they were simply people, destitute and scared and all the more dangerous for their desperation. Once in a while, Lorenz could lower his lance and offer his hand. Far more often, he could not and there was blood over the stones before lunchtime.</p><p>Lorenz, raising Thyrsus and watching a wyvern and its rider plummeting from the sky as a fireball, understood this had always been his fate. The wyvern and rider fell onto the riverbank. An uneven thud like a bunch of twigs beneath a boot. There was no scream. </p><p>“Good aim,” Ferdinand commented astride his own wyvern above Lorenz’s head. </p><p>Lorenz said nothing. He did not look to Ferdinand. Instead, he tucked Thyrsus under his arm and turned back to the command post. To write his report, he would say, if Ferdinand asked. </p><p>Ferdinand did not ask, but Lorenz knew he was smiling. </p><p> </p><p>The war is over.</p><p>It is infuriating. Lorenz has put away his weapons, although he keeps Thyrsus at hand instead of returning it to the House vault. It makes his work in the Gloucester hospital and infirmary easier, and Lorenz is so glad to use his magic to heal rather than to maim and kill. With Thyrsus in hand and working hard alongside other healers and mages, Lorenz almost feels at peace. It is hard work, and it is dirty work, but it brings Lorenz such great relief to know he is as capable at healing as killing. </p><p>“You look happy.” </p><p>Ferdinand does not often come to the hospital in town. When he does, it is because he either has business at the hospital to do with herbs or he wishes to find Lorenz. He is not much magical help, but he is hospitable to be put to work with menial tasks or using his steady hands to stitch and dress wounds while he waits. The staff generally find him to be useful and the patients consider his attentive chatter charming. The jealous part of Lorenz knows he will always have to share Ferdinand this way. </p><p>The other part of Lorenz, which is the person he wants to be so very badly, watches Ferdinand folding bedclothes. Ferdinand’s hands are gloved in white cotton, appropriate for the sanitary needs of the hospital. They are also a boon because Ferdinand’s fingers and palms are covered in thick, undelicate calluses that could snag on the sheets and pillow covers. Unlike Lorenz, who has been able to keep some beauty to his hands, Ferdinand’s are those of a career soldier more than anything else. His nails are blunt, and he does not paint them. In the evenings when they share a bath, Lorenz tries to buff the uneven ridges from Ferdinand’s nails.</p><p>Ferdinand does not tell Lorenz he will end up damaging his nails again soon enough with his lance or sword or even Ochain. Lorenz does not tell Ferdinand he is going to end up with wizened hands and arthritic joints if he doesn’t take care of them. They would laugh at each other at best. </p><p>“It is quieter these days,” Ferdinand says as Lorenz points him to where the bedclothes are stored. “It smells less like death.” </p><p>They are in relative privacy in this room, which is usually the head nurse’s office but given to Lorenz when he works here. The doors, one which leads back into the hospital and one that leads out into a very well-stocked herb garden, are open. When Ferdinand takes time to visit Lorenz in this work, he spends the afternoon in the garden, the white cotton gloves abandoned as he mucks around in the dirt. Lorenz often hears him laughing with the apothecary’s apprentices even when he’s attending patients far down the hall. </p><p>“I think the asphodel is ready for harvesting,” Ferdinand says as he shuts the lid of the storage chest; his gaze is upon the open garden door. “It is so pretty, is it not? The asphodel we grow in Aegir is different.”</p><p>“How so?” Lorenz says, standing up and adjusting his hold on Thyrsus because it is nearly time for him to make a round. </p><p>Ferdinand smiles. Warm but unkind. He peels off the cotton gloves and sets them atop the chest.</p><p>“The flowers were yellow,” he says to the garden. “We use it to induce vomiting while it is used here for gout.” </p><p>He moves, a few short strides until he is into the garden. His boots make small but echoing noises on the path. Lorenz watches him kneel in the dirt among the asphodel. Ferdinand extends his hand. Cups a white and purple bloom. He gazes at it. Unreadable and remote. </p><p>Thyrsus is useless in Lorenz’s hands. </p><p> </p><p>The worst part is: </p><p>The war is over. </p><p>Ferdinand will return to Aegir. He is, like Lorenz is Count Gloucester, Duke Aegir. He stays with Lorenz in Gloucester for now because it is where Dimitri and Byleth asked him to be until Adrestia is more stable and once again under the power of the Church. There are too many remaining loyalists in the former Empire, and Ferdinand faced four assassination attempts in the time where they were on the war campaign. As the only noble to defect from the Empire, Ferdinand is a valuable asset to the goal of a peaceful Fódlan. He can no longer live and die on his own accord. </p><p>And because of this, for Lorenz, the war is not over. Lorenz stood on the Bridge, and he watched Adrestia devour itself for five years. He watched the seasons wax and wane, and, from the third year onwards, Ferdinand was by his side. It was poetic in a way. Two noble scions of two ancient houses guarding the bridge over the great river. </p><p>It was there they met, on the anniversary of the fall of Garreg Mach. </p><p>“Lorenz,” Ferdinand says.</p><p>He held the Spear of Assal and a shield that Lorenz recognised from an old illuminated manuscript as Ochain, the Lion Shield. His hair fluttered in the breeze coming from the south, and his wyvern’s wings were open, ready to fight or take flight. </p><p>Lorenz watched Ferdinand blink. He did not cry, and Lorenz wondered if he was capable of it, or if he was like Lorenz, who had already given too much of himself away. </p><p>They did not belong to the Goddess nor to the Saints and Heroes whose Crests they bore. </p><p>They were born of the earth.</p><p>“I know why you are here,” Ferdinand said. </p><p>Lorenz lowered Thyrsus as Ferdinand lowered Assal. </p><p>They were bred for war. </p><p> </p><p>In Lorenz’s bedroom:</p><p>Ferdinand tastes like lemon sweets from across the Throat. </p><p>He likes Almyran sweets. Claude sends them over the Throat through secret couriers, and the little boxes arrive along with important papers and precious seeds for planting. Lorenz finds sometimes the sweets are so sour they hurt his teeth. He does taste each batch, though, if only to see Ferdinand laugh at his reaction and expressions. They send the sweets along to Lysithea, who enjoys them the most, and then spend the next week working through Claude’s information and planting the seeds in the hospital garden.</p><p>Beneath his hands, Ferdinand chuckles as Lorenz pulls back for air. </p><p>“You really dislike sour things,” he sighs, leaning forward to kiss Lorenz’s cheek. </p><p>“I am not in the mood for teasing,” Lorenz says because he is not; it is not something he enjoys in bed anymore than he does out of it. “How many of those things did you eat?”</p><p>“Only two,” Ferdinand says, adjusting his hold around Lorenz’s waist. “They have a strong taste, and it is satisfying to have a few.” </p><p>Lorenz looks down at him. Ferdinand’s hair is wild on the bed, but it is also wild in general. It is exactly like him in its personality because there is a large part of Ferdinand that is unruly and rebellious. Ferdinand’s body and mind move at only his pace and to his own ideals. He would not have been able to leave the Empire if not for these qualities. </p><p>It is why, when Ferdinand pulls him down with a warm, welcoming smile, Lorenz goes. He tries to kiss Lorenz, but Lorenz moves his face away to nuzzle the sensitive skin where his jaw connects to his neck. It makes Ferdinand huff out a ticklish laugh. </p><p>“Are you not going to kiss me because I taste like lemons?” </p><p>“Yes,” Lorenz says because the honesty makes Ferdinand laugh again. </p><p>At the edge of their vision, Ochain and Thyrsus lean close at the bedside. It feels right and gives them the only security they can trust. Their kisses and touches and even their invasions of each other’s bodies are watched over by the pieces of themselves they were born to wield. </p><p>On the Bridge, coated in the blood of others –</p><p>On the battlefield, dancing with death –</p><p>“Lorenz,” Ferdinand breathes.</p><p>They are connected. </p><p>“Ferdinand,” Lorenz invokes. </p><p>Together:</p><p>They are victorious.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Connect with me on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/Metallic_Sweet">@Metallic_Sweet</a>!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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